Landscape Structure as the Regulator of the Siberian Stone Pine Growth Dynamics in the Northern Taiga of Western Siberia

• Published in: Geography and natural resources 2022-06, Vol.43 (2), p.156-162
• Main Authors: Volovinskii, I. V., Khoroshev, A. V., Bochkarev, Yu. N.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bogs; Cores; Dendrochronology; Earth and Environmental Science; Economic Geography; Fluctuations; Frost; Geography; Image classification; Independent variables; Lakes; Landscape; Landscape/Regional and Urban Planning; Mounds; Peat; Peat bogs; Permafrost; Pine; Pine trees; Principal components analysis; Regional Problems of Environmental Studies and Natural Resources Utilization; Regression analysis; River basins; Satellite imagery; Slopes; Standardization; Statistical analysis; Stone; Taiga; Variability
• ISSN: 1875-3728; 1875-371X
• DOI: 10.1134/S1875372822020111

This paper presents the results of studies aimed at identifying statistical relationships between the landscape structure and variability in Siberian stone pine ( Pinus sibirica ) increments in the permafrost–hillocky northern-taiga landscapes of Western Siberia (Nadym River basin). Dendrochronologies of Siberian stone pine growing on frost mounds of different types are compiled. Principal component analysis is applied to obtain independent variables that describe the site and landscape structure of the territory. Cores from 512 trees growing on 23 frost mounds are analyzed. The following methods are used: crossdating, dendrochronological standardization, and the elimination of monotonic trends for each tree. Results of the classification of Sentinel satellite images were used to calculate the proportions of lakes, forests, sparse forests, floating bogs, and flat–hillocky peat bogs, with the radius of the vicinity of a frost mound of 100‒2000 m. Correlation, dispersion, and regression analyses are used in the analysis of the dependence of the median increment on the characteristic of the mound site and landscape neighborhoods. It has been established that on high mounds the variability in increments is higher on tops than on slopes, whereas the situation is often reversed on low mounds. It is also found that the tops and slopes of the frost mounds respond differently to climatic fluctuations depending on the landscape structure and the height of the mound: the close proximity of lakes reduces the variability of phytoproductive functioning on the summit surfaces. It is revealed that the sensitivity of Siberian stone pine growth to temperature fluctuations increases with an increase in the diversity of the facies structure caused by the development of thermokarst subsidence and cryogenic cracks.